Der Tod und das Mädchen
by Lotos-Eater
Summary: [NejiTen] From the moment he first spied the slick sheen of wet red blood on her hand when they were twelve he saw how easily it could all slip away.


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**Der Tod und das Mädchen**

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From the moment he first spied the slick sheen of wet red blood on her hand when they were twelve, battling their first superior opponent and easily outmatched – not for lack of skill, but for lack of experience and worldliness, because in spite of the fact they thought of themselves as hardened warriors they were really just starry-eyed children – in that instant he saw how precarious everything was and how easily it could all slip away. What their sensei hid with a jubilant smile and Lee hid with blind ambition was immediately obvious to both of them as soon as the dark stain dripped onto her pink tunic.

_We are not long for this world._

After the battle their eyes met, and it seemed to him that they came to a silent understanding: that was then, this is now. That was the battle, and that is all there is to us. She was made of weapons and he was made of bitter hate. In a lot of ways back then she was stronger than he – and even now, after all the years between their naive genin days and the body count that stood over their mutual heads now, she was still wiser, for all that he looked the part. We are neither of us long for this world. Every drop of blood drew them closer to the edge.

Shinobi, on average, didn't live long. Not even the great ones. The greatest, in fact, seemed to burn out like bright candles, vanishing before their time in a brief grasp at bravery, pity, humanity. The Fourth fell like this, and so did many before him. Old ninja always had a sense of humor: how else could they live with the idea that their clocks had run out long ago, and every moment now was a moment of borrowed time? There was nothing you could do but watch, laugh, and expect death at every turn.

Neji helped her bandage her hand after that battle when they were twelve. It had only been a kunai, but it had cut her in a sensitive place, the apex of her hand, the juncture between her thumb and forefinger. It was the first time the two of them had faced anyone alone. They had been paired up to cover one flank while Gai and Lee covered the other. As soon as the enemy retreated he had rushed over to her, half expecting her to fall down dead. But while he carefully wrapped the gauze around her wound to staunch the flow of blood, she merely grinned and blushed. Naive as he was, and ignorant of everything beyond his own troubles, he didn't realize why until much later.

"That was close," he said unhappily.

"Not that close," she said, her brow creased with offense. "A lucky hit for him."

_A lucky hit for you,_ he thought.

Slowly over the years he got used to seeing his life as a game. A branch member was not meant to amount to anything. When the Hyuuga wanted to keep a ninja, they kept him – or her – out of the Konoha ranks. Whereas Neji was on the front line half the time. But life _was _a game. It made perfect sense that they had made a gambler the Hokage.

Mission after mission they won and won, lived and lived. The Hyuuga were clearly getting nervous. The average ninja lifespan was around twenty-eight years, but years before he even neared it he could tell that they knew he was different: they knew he just might win.

Eventually he realized that Tenten had always understood. Was always the wiser one when it came to battle. Everything was a game to her. A competition: a game. Even her idol was a gambler.

Sometimes she won, sometimes she lost, but she always walked away with a slight smile on her face. _That was fun. Let's do it again. _He didn't understand how she, with no family or heritage to speak of, could look at her life with such a cavalier attitude. But a day came when he stopped wondering and started to realize that her soft eyes, her slight smile, were things that only he saw: to everyone else she was a hardened kunoichi. To him, she let herself ease up a little. Only he understood her game.

He was slow to act in everything, which is why so many years passed before their smiles grew any closer to each other. But they were shinobi, and it was foolish to wait for anything that might not come along again. A lost chance was lost forever. Rather to regret the things you hadn't done, it was better to regret the things you did. With this understanding he pulled her aside one day after they had finished debriefing the Hokage on their mission, and without words or hesitation he stopped her maniacal secret smile with a swift pull of his lips. She returned the kiss so viciously that he hardly remembered the next twelve hours, and yet he'd never forget them.

He knew that they might not have time for long and tearful goodbyes someday, so he quickly told her that he loved her.

As soon as he woke up with her curled up on his shoulder he realized that his life was a nightmare. Every other day she was close to death, and so was he. It started with her bleeding hand, and then the streak of blood across her face; then the way her ribs tried to crush her lungs, or the hole that the minion of Orochimaru made in his chest. The crooked angle of her broken leg, bone poking out through the skin. The worried look on her face when he regained consciousness and felt the soreness of his head and the sting of blood in his eyes. Blindness. Shock. Pain. And like lunatics they kept going back for more. He thought that she was so ambitious because she was charmed by the danger of it all.

It came to a head during one mission. She was captured and it would have been useless to go back for her. He needed to achieve the mission objective, and he couldn't let his emotions interfere with this, because he was a proud ninja and a Hyuuga, and to cave in to such a thing would be shameful.

Yet there he was, and he had killed three enemy nin already, and he still had no idea where she was. For all that his eyes could see, he was heading blindly in the wrong direction and he didn't care. It was for many reasons that he had disregarded the mission entirely: he was young, and she was young, and in spite of the fact that they'd found each other in time he couldn't fathom life without her just yet. He refused to outlive her. And even if he died, she could keep on going…

Hours later, his uniform soaked with her blood, after he had stopped the bleeding and she had just barely regained consciousness, she looked up at him with eyes that were almost curious. "You shouldn't have come back for me," she said. "It'll be worse now that they know ..."

She was probably right: chances were good they wouldn't make it home alive. There were still many risks ahead. She knew this – had always been the wiser of the two. In spite of his natural talents, she was the one that was far-seeing.

Ignoring everything, even the fact that they were far from home in enemy territory, he buried his face in her hair and breathed her in through his nose again and again, letting himself feel her alive below him. What were the chances that they'd make it this far? In how many parallel universes had they both died back when they were twelve?

"Neji, we have to move," she said uneasily, even though she could barely speak.

"I know."

"We won't be able to hide here for long."

"I know."

"Please Neji. Even if there's no chance, we have to…"

"I know," he repeated, breathing her in, holding her cool cheek to his.

With her, he feels like the lazy child he never was, waking up in the morning to dull, throbbing sunlight and cool air and warmth beneath his blankets, and in spite of the reality he knows they must face he finds himself saying, "A little longer. Just a little longer."

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End file.
